The impersonal character of the above expressions would not be shown by the genitive since the participle in that case marks a distinction between masculine (neuter) and feminine. The accusative absolute, which occurs first in Herodotus and the Attic prose writers of the fifth century, is probably in its origin an internal accusative, developed, at least in part, by way of apposition ( cross991- cross994), the neuter of a participle or of an adjective standing in apposition to an idea in the leading clause. Thus, προσταχθὲν αὐτοῖς οὐκ ἐτόλμησαν εἰσαγαγεῖν (Is. 1.22) they did not dare to bring him in—a duty that was enjoined (although it was enjoined) upon them. Cp. πείθει δ' Ὀρέστην μητέρα . . . κτεῖναι, πρὸς οὐχ ἅπαντας εὔκλειαν φέρονhe persuaded Orestes to slay his mother, a deed that brings not glory in the eyes of allE.Or. 30.